Sunday, August 9, 2015

Kennis Wong, of Itch to Stitch designs, is a phenomenal pattern designer. I've followed her for a while now, and have three or four of her patterns. The Jacqueline Hoodie is one that I plan to sew up soon, for this Fall. Her Idyllwild top has taken the pdf pattern world by storm, since it's a gorgeous basic tee or dress, and used to be only a dollar. I planned the Emily Culottes for this summer, but since I'm in the process of losing a significant amount of weight, I wanted to stick to elastic waistbands.

I applied over and over to test Kennis' designs, and lo and behold, I got in! Here's the super fun Carey Top, a lovely dolman-sleeve design that flatterns all body shapes. The incredibly clever drawstrings give you the freedom to ruche the sleeve along the outer arm as much or as little as you want, going from a three-quarter sleeve length to a short sleeve length. You could even use elastic!

The pattern goes from size 00 to 20. with comprehensive body and finished garment sizes given right in the listing, in imperial and in metric. No more buying the pattern only to find it won't fit you! I love when designers are thoughtful and bring their A game like Kennis does, every time.

There's a little guide in the listing and in the pattern, to help you choose your size. As you know, ready to wear sizes are inflated and usually don't fit as nicely as when you choose your size and tailor your clothing, so this will help beginners tremendously.

I used a cotton lycra gauze, and a contrasting dark navy-black solid knit for my top. It was a tough time, binding this gauze, but I think I did really well! I love this top, and V couldn't believe I made it. He kept insisting I bought it somewhere!